☆Peril☆

The only way Chameleon survived was to stick to a powerful person like a parasite. He immediately became whatever was asked of him-- the funny friend, charming boyfriend, crazy-over-his-stepdaughter stepdad. 

Never a good father. Because he never saw it as something necessary. 

Chameleon never had any power except his shifting personality. So he gained people's trust and sucked secrets off them. And when he needed them to do something, he used those secrets to his own advantage. That was how he survived.

He taught his survival skills to me when I was seven. At then, I viewed it as a little game. Hearing a secret gave my seven-year-old self a small happiness, because I didn't even know what they were going to be about. 

When Chameleon brought me to his friend's-- a famous movie director-- house, I looked around it as if under a spell. A big, shiny house with stairs and so many rooms that I lost count. The man gave me a dazzling smile, and introduced me to his son, Jambu. He was a few years older than me. He squirmed under his father's hand, which I couldn't understand. 

After a while, two women arrived, and both men's face lighted up. Chameleon was staring at a red-haired woman, and I could tell-- even then-- that he was planning something. After her came a girl a little taller than me. "Scarlet would be delighted to meet Peril. I heard Peril's first in her grade, so she will have no problem catching up with an older girl. Right, girls?"

Scarlet quickly turned to me with narrowed eyes. "Of course." Then she eyed Chameleon, and then me. "Hey, Chameleon."

"Hey, little angel." Chameleon lifted her up and ran in circles-- something he had never done to me. "How have you been, you troublemaker?"

The woman next to Scarlet's mother was Anaconda-- I had seen her on TV. She stood there, her lips pressed together. It was an expression that I had never seen on TV. Her husband tried to reach for her hand, but when she snatched it away, he gave an exasperated sigh. "Chameleon, let's go to my study to talk."

Chameleon set Scarlet down, and Scarlet gave me a look that said, see? I don't know who you are, but he likes me more. It made me jealous, but also a little superior, because I knew it was all an act.

Finally, Chameleon turned to me. "Peril, go and play with Jambu and Scarlet. Father's going to talk to his friend in his study, okay?"

"Okay!" 

Chameleon was looking at the man and Anaconda, back and forth, as if trying to catch something. A secret? I wanted to know, too.

After an hour of playing with Scarlet-- and concluding that she had some sort of narcissism (although I didn't know the exact word back then)-- I tried to look for Chameleon because I really wanted to go home.

A room with a locked door soon came into sight, and I could hear voices. That was when I remembered what Chameleon said about secrets, and decided to eavesdrop.

"Anaconda has been like that ever since the car accident couple years ago." A huge sigh. What accident? "How dare she be mad at me when she doesn't even know what I did? The nerve! With Jambu, too. Of course she's almost never home to take care of him. And can you believe it? They had a child. A little girl."

"God, I never saw Anaconda that way. If my wife did such a thing...You're a saint to keep her as a wife. But it's necessary, seeing Jambu's age..."

"I know! In my crazy moments, I thought about killing her. But then, what would happen to our reputation? To Jambu? And I hate myself for saying this, but I still love her, Chameleon, my God." Silence. The words about killing surprised me, but I still listened. "If I can't kill her, I thought, who can I kill? That man. And I know some people that does those kinds of things, and they got the job done. It was clean and fast, they framed it like a natural accident. All it took was a little bit of money." A crazed laughter.

"Who are they?" I couldn't see Chameleon's face, but I could imagine it, hiding that little smile behind all his fake colors. "Interesting, I've never heard of such things..."

"A woman named Battlewinner. A crazy bitch." 

"What happened to the daughter? How old is she?"

"Close to your daughter's age. Maybe the same. I don't know, Anaconda keeps her so secret. I only knew she existed when she moved to Grandeur's house. I can't kill a girl, could I?" He snorted. "I thought about it. But then, it would be too suspicious. Anaconda would immediately think that I did something. So I did something else."

Close to my age. I could hear my heart beating. Thump.

"What did you do?"

Thump.

"Anaconda is a woman that's obsessed with her status. She would hesitate to tell people that she cheated. She would be scared to reveal the girl. And if it's a girl with cancer? She wouldn't even think about it."

Thump.

"Cancer? What do you mean? The child has cancer?"

Thump.

"I ordered Battlewinner to inject the girl with cancer cells a couple years ago. It's revealing now."

"How do you know?" Chameleon seemed amused.

He's talking about a girl in my age. Being injected with cancer cells. Sounding amused.

What if that was me? Would he sound the same?

"I contact someone that works in Grandeur's house. A little money and she tells me everything. It's almost funny."

Thump.

That was when I ran away. I couldn't bear to hear it anymore. The secret was nothing like what I had imagined, and I felt abrupt fear at the world for not being what it used to be. That my father was nothing like what I father should be.

A few months later, he would announce that his marriage to Scarlet's mother. He got richer and richer-- probably by threatening people to reveal their secrets. After all, he always recorded his conversations that he shared with his closest friends. Anaconda's husband, no doubt, was probably one of them.

Soon, he replaced Scarlet with me, and I was always overshadowed by her. Following her like a servant, doing whatever she wanted me to do. Never saying a word.

I had also become a chameleon. Hoping that Scarlet would drop me a secret. Hoping to someday have power over her. Throwing everything important to me away in the process, just like my father.

☆

☆Greatness☆

I had been a chameleon all my life, hiding underneath my mother's shadow, closing my eyes, changing color whenever I saw something horrible.

I had not been a brave person wanting to face the world's cruelty from the start. I was part of it. Or worse, I was just watching, unable to do anything because I was afraid for my life.

But one day, I heard Battlewinner asking about "cancer cell injection". The man replied that it had been successfully done. Curious, I mustered up the courage to speak to my mother. I thought about which voice would please her the most. Shifting colors as a chameleon, I asked her in a weak, timid voice: "What was that about?"

She seemed slightly surprised, but that expression turned into a sneer. "You're finally talking to me? Are you done viewing me as a monster?"

For killing my father? Yes.

When I didn't reply, she looked at me straight into the eye, daring at me to look away. I did. "One of our clients ordered us to inject cancer cells into a five year old. He wants her dead. We think it worked." My hands started trembling. "What a pity, isn't it? That could have been you. If you haven't been my daughter. If you had been weaker."

All my life, when there were terrible things happening around me, I could just shake it off. Thinking, I'll never go through that. It isn't my problem. 

But this made me realize that it could have been me. And I could suddenly imagine it happening to me-- the horror. What if the girl doesn't even know? The realization that this wasn't just murder-- it was horrible cruelty. Destroying someone's life before they even had a chance to live through it. It was so sudden, so monstrous, that it brought tears to my eyes.

"If someone asked you to do that to me," I asked quietly. Holding my hands so that it wouldn't tremble anymore. "Would you have done it?"

Say you wouldn't.

But she had already killed my father. What was holding her back? Her last conscience? But if she had any, she woudln't-- couldn't-- have killed him.

Battlewinner didn't look at me, and a long silence ensued. Finally, she answered. "Yes. If they offered me enough money."

That day, I realized that I didn't want to be be still anymore. I would declare war on every cruelty that existed in this world. I would no longer trying live quietly, shifting my colors until I blended and nobody noticed me. I would never be a chameleon again. I would destroy those who harmed others.

The first thing I did after that was betraying my mother.